Fatwa lets starving Syrians eat cats and dogs

Ruth Sherlock

A Muslim cleric in a rebel-held district of Damascus has issued a fatwa, or ruling, allowing people to eat cats and dogs to ward off starvation after months of siege by the Assad regime.

Salah al-Khatib, the imam who issued the ruling, said he had no choice but to lift the usual Islamic dietary restrictions, after government forces and pro-regime militias choked off food and medical supplies to three rebel-held suburbs of Damascus and a camp housing Palestinian refugees. This is ''not because it is religiously permitted, but because it is a reflection of the reality we are suffering'', Mr Khatib said on Tuesday.